" What did you mean by' went crazy'?" Mulder demanded to know.

" When I first destroyed the beacon, some of the people wanted to kill me, but Emanuel forbid to, saying that they didn't have time to. If they didn't act immediately those scout ships were going to come and punish them for being traitors, and it was going to the worse than dying."

" They plan to fight?" Scully asked.

Mulder and William exchanged a look. " No, to die."

William nodded, not mentioning the suicide he witnessed. " When I was getting Benji and Owen away I heard a lot of gunfire. There weren't a lot of people still around when I looked for guns for you." He pulled a lot of his backpack and handed them over. Mulder quickly wiped off the fingerprints with his shirt and threw them to the ground. " Why did you do that?"

" We don't want our prints on those guns. Not if there are people dead."

" Oh. I don't think you'll need them anyway... now."

All Mulder could think of was the video for "Jeremy" by Pearl Jam; It'd barely been on his radar when it had been popular, but it was in his mind now. All the clean clothes were splattered with blood, which made stark contrast to the light earth tones of the fabrics. The difference, however, was that unlike in the video, it was their own blood.

They were dead. Andrew, Steven, Emanuel... all of them. A fragment of prayer ran through Scully's mind "Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death..." her hand on William shoulder tightened as she steered him past the carnage; at least there were no children.

"This is like the Temple of the Seven Stars." Mulder said softly, but Scully shook her head. Poison was far less messy, them from the defensive postures of some of the corpses, it was clear they hadn't died by their own hands.

A siren broke the silence. Two minutes later a police cruiser pulled into view, and another and another. As soon as the first came to a stop, a voice over a speaker demanded they drop their weapons and put up their arms. Mulder and Scully raised their hands knowing the drill, but William was frightened. It wasn't supposed to end like this.

Scully noticed his expression, and whispered to him. " Whoever sent them here probably got a description of you from one of your brothers. They have to make sure father and I am not two of the kidnappers." He breathed easier once an officer took their IDs and determined that they were victims, not captors.

That officer spoke to them. " Okay folks, this is was going to happen now. You look ok, but one of the officers going to bring you to the hospital where the other boys are and have you checked out. Then, once a little one has his cast, the five of your are going to give your statements about what happened here."

They could hear Benji complaining that he wanted to see them while residents in the ER gave them the once over. As soon as Mulder's cut was cleaned, they were allowed to see Benji. Wriggling impatiently, he grabbed his father by the hand and dragged him to him to Owen's room.

Owen was lying on the hospital bed, scowling; an old-fashioned cast, chalk white, was on his left arm. " Daddy, they said I got to lie here another half-hour 'fore the cast dries. Do I really gotta?"

" I'm afraid you do, kiddo. Doctors are sticklers the things like that." He noticed Scully's smirk. "You don't want them coming in here and yelling at you, right? But how about we call Mommy? That'll pass the time."

Okay!"

Even though she was eager to speak her husband, Cat let Kyle and Avery talk to him a moment - after she spoke to him long enough to know they were safe. When she got the phone back Mulder explained everything that happened in great detail, and Owen and Benji made slightly less coherent reports. Last of all, she spoke to William.

What she hadn't been prepared for, now that everyone was safe, were the tears and anguish in his voice. "I'm sorry, Cat. I'm sorry."

"For what?"

" Everything! It's because of me we got taken away, and you had to leave too, and its my fault that they hurt Owen since I couldn't do what they wanted. If you hate me now, and want me to go away, I understand." He concluded with sniffles.

" Hold up! I don't know what those people said to you, but you are just eleven years old. You could make grown people do anything they didn't want to, no matter if they said that's why they were doing it."

" But-"

" Your dad said they wanted aliens to come so they didn't have to be responsible for themselves. Do you think that's true?"

" Yes..."

" Doesn't blaming a kid for causing them to do bad thing sounds like a way to avoid responsibility?"

" Yeah." William admitted.

" Good. Don't you ever forget that the bad things they did to your family isn't your fault, and what they did to themselves isn't your fault either." Cat said firmly.

" Really?" His tone was half-desperate.

" Really. And from what I hear, you're quite the hero, getting your brothers to safety, finding your parents..."